Qliphoth and Kenneth Grant
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Nightside is the most useful I have found. Very heavy on the Qabalah of AL, how to use the Keys, and is an elaboration of Liber 231. It does seem bizzare...I had to read the book a few times to get it. Which makes sense now since the arcana presented is non-linear and must manifest as such in the text. It is quite coherent. There i potentially dangerous information in there I question if he should have revealed specifically around the Atus and a few others, including secret keys. But I suppose he veiled and withheld enough such that it is still somewhat hidden. Aside from the typesetting issues in the print itself, its one of his better ones and has helped me a great deal in studying AL, specifcally the Qabalah and numeric ciphers.
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You have a point that Grant seems to undermine the very basis of the qlphth. I've seen a number of writers of the lucifarian etal trad. do the same with infernal dimansions...there is a certain sympathy with wrathful deities from the east. a kind of exploration and speculation geared towards formulating perspectives in the western mystical currents a sensabilty of this. a kind of untabooing the usage of destructive forces and seeing the benefit of said influences. also he does seem to simply enjoy manuevering ideas around echother to effect the angle of perception. the qliphoth seems to lose it meaning when made into attributes to be saught though sometimes you must stear into a skid to correct it.
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@HRUMACHIS said
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@Angel of Death said
"Is that magic eight ball on your desk??? What is this supposed to be a picture of/for?"Did you even bother to do the Qabalah of the Atu presented? Or do all yourThelemic answers come from magic 8 balls?"
Hey no need to get nasty.
I was genuiney curious why you posted this picture, nothing in the thread seemed to point to what the purpose of sharing your desk lamp, et al is about. And it does look like a magic eight ball on the blue cloth.
As for your questions.....
I have my own work to do, and yes I have and do work with the Atu in regards to my own life.
No, I do not own a magic eight ball anymore. I did when I was a child. My answers come from my heart.I was trying to encourage you to share more about your picture,
I see now it simply was something you personal found relevance in and just wanted to share.
Nice furniture by the way, that desk is an Espicially fine piece.
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My guess is that he thinks that the contents of the desk are visible. I only see the cards etc. on a very large screen. On most screens, they are completely cut off and it does, indeed, look like mostly a picture of a lamp, rather than a layout of Tarot trumps.
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@HRUMACHIS said
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@Angel of Death said
"Is that magic eight ball on your desk??? What is this supposed to be a picture of/for?"Did you even bother to do the Qabalah of the Atu presented? Or do all yourThelemic answers come from magic 8 balls?"
Which Qabalah? Your Qabalah, or my Qabalah? Or Crowley's Qabalah? Jim's Qabalah?
MagusEmpress+Devil Moon+Aeon
FortuneBethDaleth+Ayin Qoph+Shin
Kaph13+15 18+20
1024+70 100+300
20MercuryVenus+Capricorn Pisces+Spirit/Fire
Jupiter -
There appears to be a whiteboard on the wall at the back of the picture. That must be very helpful for "doing the qabalah".
But I do like the image of Hrumachis pacing up and down in front of his whiteboard which is covered in qabalistic scrawlings talking animatedly to himself as he tries to figure out some obscure passage in the Zohar. Suddenly, like a bolt from the blue the answer comes - "yes, yes, it's been right in front of my eyes all this time!" "I have it! I have it!"
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@Angel of Death said
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@HRUMACHIS said
"
@Angel of Death said
"Is that magic eight ball on your desk??? What is this supposed to be a picture of/for?"Did you even bother to do the Qabalah of the Atu presented? Or do all yourThelemic answers come from magic 8 balls?"
Hey no need to get nasty.
I was genuiney curious why you posted this picture, nothing in the thread seemed to point to what the purpose of sharing your desk lamp, et al is about. And it does look like a magic eight ball on the blue cloth.
As for your questions.....
I have my own work to do, and yes I have and do work with the Atu in regards to my own life.
No, I do not own a magic eight ball anymore. I did when I was a child. My answers come from my heart.I was trying to encourage you to share more about your picture,
I see now it simply was something you personal found relevance in and just wanted to share.
Nice furniture by the way, that desk is an Espicially fine piece.
"I apologize. I read it as a sarcastic comment. Thank you for clarifying. Given the nature of the material I was sharing, it is to be taken very seriously. I encourage others to check the math and explore the arrangement. These are not opinions or feelings, they are mathematical facts which are aligned with Thelemic Keys and symbolic interpretations that can be independently verified in the work of Therion and the Book of the Law.
Mr. Takamba, the only Qabalah I use is based strictly on the Atu. I use the Atu number, the Hebrew value, the paths, and the mystic numbers. Sometimes the tunnel numbers, and the Sefirot, when I am guided as such. And plain old arithmetic.
These Keys were a gift from my Angel in a fever dream, confirmed with the math and Keys. It is in my oath and Will to disclose part but not all of the equation, which by any measure I hope will further the grounding of the energies of the Aeon and Thelema on this planet.
The arrangement is an extract of a larger configuration which by Hebrew is allocated into 3 arrangements based on the Keys of 333, 666, and 496. This one is 496.
http://quantumconfigurations.com/images/496.jpg
496 is the sum of 0-31, thereby a power series of the Key.
496 is a composite of Keys, 418+78
496 symbolizes Leviathan, from the mouth of the Dragon rushed the infernal waters of Daath.
The total sum of Atu I and Atu x is 66, indicating the power of Jupiter reflected through Mercury to accomplish the Great Work.
The total sum of the arrangement is 696, meaning IPSOS and RPSTOVAL.
The numeration of the horizontal Atu is 474, the number of Daath, and spells QDOSh (by anagram), which has many related meanings.
The sum of QDOSh Path + Atu is 156
OSh = 370, creation as matter and spirit cancelling to 0 as unity, the Sabbatic Goat, and others.
Add the Moon and becomes 470, DVR DVRIM, eternity, cycle of cycles, aeon of aeons.
The Empress completes Daath as 474.
The number 496 is a very important number in superstring theory. In 1984, Michael Green and John H. Schwarz realized that one of the necessary conditions for a superstring theory to make sense is that the dimension of the gauge group of type I string theory must be 496. The group is therefore SO(32). Their discovery started the first superstring revolution. It was realized in 1985 that the heterotic string can admit another possible gauge group, namely E8 x E8.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/496_(number
There are many other Keys in this arrangement. The remaining 16 Atu are divided into 9 cards whose Hebrew sum is 333 and Hebrew plus Atu is 418. The remaining 7 numerate to 666.
The full arrangement in the grouping of Keys 9 (333), 6 (496) and 7 (666) form the sigil of Neptune.
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@christinespandex said
"I'm new to all of this, but i've checked out kenneth grant and he seems mad as a hatter. The advantage of this is that I can see anyone who reveres him is probably on the same path of confusion and dispersion and should thus be avoided as well. Like attracts like."
I knew Kenneth Grant for more than thirty years, was his publisher from the mid nineties, and I can assure you that he was not "mad as a hatter". He was a highly intelligent man, astonishingly well-read, with a warm and generous character. He could, of course, also on occasion be stubborn and inflexible, but so can we all. His books can sometimes seem forbidding at first glance, as can that of many authors, but they repay perseverence.
Revere? This is to confuse the planes, surely? Although I have a high estimation of Grant, I didn't and don't revere him. I have a high estimation of the work of Crowley and Spare among many others, but I don't revere them. My favourite musical artist is probably Joni Mitchell, but I don't revere her. Why should it be otherwise?
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@Iamus said
"I wonder if Nema wasn't primed by Grant's writings to see Liber Pennae Penumbra as announcing the the dual current/AEon."
I don't think that's the case. She first wrote to Grant in 1975 whilst Cults of the Shadow was being printed. Up until that point, Grant had been somewhat sceptical of Achad's announcement in April 1948 of the inception of the Ma-Ion. Liber Pennae Praenumbra and the account of its reception led him to reassess Achad's work. The fruits of this reassessment can be seen in Part 1 of the subsequent book, Nightside of Eden, published in 1977.
@Iamus said
"Ignoring her interpretation, it seems to me that the work is a vision of a coming AEon, but one that's is firmly rooted in the perspective of the current AEon. That would make it not totally disimilar from the the Apocalypse of John under the view that that work is actually a vision of the AEon of Horus, but seen from an Osirian perspective. Obviously Pennae Penumbra doesn't see the AEon of Maat as armageddon; similarly there's no anti-Horus parallel to the way the Beast was seen as the anti-Christ."
Whn Achad first announced the inception of the Ma-Ion, in subsequent correspondence with Gerald Yorke he made clear that he did not see the Ma-Ion as superceding the Aeon of Horus, but rather as complementing it, as ameliorating the Force and Fire of Horus. Interestingly there is a parallel with the work of Parsons here, as Parsons too thought that the fierceness of the Aeon of Horus needed counterbalancing. Liber Pennae Praenumbra strikes a somewhat different note in my opinion, but has its antecedents in the work of Crowley, Achad and Parsons.
@Iamus said
"If I'm on to something there, that would be be further proof that Nema's work is squarely within the current AEon, because it's view on AEons is essentially the same as that presented in Thelemic literature. I wonder if that sheds any light on Grant. Maybe someone more familiar with his work could comment. What if he's so caught up in the idea that new AEons/currents are a good thing that he's tried to force the process and leap beyond the AEon of Horus less than a century after its inauguration?"
It's an interesting point, but no, I don't think that Grant tried to force the process. Rather, he was picking up on something that Achad highlighted, that was parallelled to some extent in the work of Parsons when assessing the Babalon Working, and which was reflected in Liber Pennae Praenumbra several decades later.
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Michael, unfortunately at this point I'd have to assume that the two posters you're replying to are rarely around these parts. At least, I haven't seen either since I started posting about a year ago.
However, I've been interested in getting a better understanding of Grant -- having only read The Magical Revival once last year sometime -- and, since you're the guy in the know, any suggestions/recommendations/guidelines? Should I just read through the trilogy and see what I can see? Or is there a historical/biographical overview of his work that might give me a better framework to start with?
Thanks for keeping the books in print!
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@Gnosomai Emauton said
"However, I've been interested in getting a better understanding of Grant -- having only read The Magical Revival once last year sometime -- and, since you're the guy in the know, any suggestions/recommendations/guidelines? Should I just read through the trilogy and see what I can see? Or is there a historical/biographical overview of his work that might give me a better framework to start with?"
In my view it's best to read the trilogies sequentially. The first trilogy - The Magical Revival, Aleister Crowley and the Hidden God, and Cults of the Shadow - is the most straightforward, and will provide a basis for the subsequent two trilogies.
There is an article, Scintillations in Mauve, an overview of the trilogies which was published in the last issue of Starfire. A link to it:
www.starfirepublishing.co.uk/downloads/scintillations_in_mauve.pdf
This can of course be saved locally.
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Thanks! I'll check it out.
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Michael, thank you for your efforts to republish the trilogies. I'm glad I waited and did not get gouged by private sellers, although I did buy Nightside a few years back, at a fair price though and it was well worth it.
Some of Grants writing and technical Kung Foo could lead people to misunderstand his work. Of some of the critics I have read, it is clear they did not understand the content, and would rather assume it is nonsense than admit they don't get it. I found he was very clever in his books the way information is layered and positioned, which means it is necessary for me at least to reread items after some clarification in a later book. I suspect he engineered this type of structure, which permeates the books in a nonlinear and 'acausal' approach, not unlike being outside of time and space. It's clear he was quite brilliant and I have learned many things from his work and expect to continue to do so. I look forward to the publishing of the rest of the trilogies. Thanks again.